


hold tight to those you love (not for fear of their loss, but for love of their presence)

by AssyEr



Series: Soulmates But Mech Flavored [1]
Category: The Mechanisms (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, And all that fun stuff, Angst and Feels, Angst with a Happy Ending, Fluff and Angst, I think so?, M/M, Philosophy, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, but a series cause i like the concept, except not, i cant believe i had a title for this, in which i shout at you that the least interesting part of soulmates aus, is the happy soulmate couple, no beta we die like men, of one shots, they discuss what is love, you know what? its gonna be a series now
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-06
Updated: 2020-08-06
Packaged: 2021-03-05 20:01:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,590
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25741009
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AssyEr/pseuds/AssyEr
Summary: "He didn’t ask immediately, instead taking time to make sure to say it right. It was fine, he could wait for as long as he needed. Finally, “Do you think our relationship is fake?”It hurt."In a world where people soulmate's marks are on their wrists, Brian and Marius ponder on the consequences of not being able to find theirs.Or; in which I yell at you about my opinions of love.
Relationships: Drumbot Brian/Marius von Raum
Series: Soulmates But Mech Flavored [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1867225
Comments: 20
Kudos: 68
Collections: Writer's Month 2020





	hold tight to those you love (not for fear of their loss, but for love of their presence)

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Writer's Month prompt: Soulmates
> 
> I have been bouncing around since i saw the prompt list for the chance to write this

The room was in complete silence, the air war warm and the lights dimmed. This was not complete unusual, given the high hours of the night, but this time it managed to make the drumbot feel queasy. Next to him, Marius huddled his head on his chest, cuddling even closer. He couldn’t see his face, just his black curls and the arm that stretched over him in a half hug, but he could feel some sort of heaviness coming from him, and he couldn’t stop the feeling of dread.

He had been in that mood for a couple days now, Marius. Not for whole days, but there were moments were he would catch him looking at nothing with a sad expression, or just his smile not being as wide as it should be. But he hadn’t said anything, and Brian knew to give him time. He wasn’t like Jonny or Tim in that matter, he was prone to share. Just, when he felt he was willing.

Brian had been waiting, patiently. Not asking, not demanding, but in soft quietness. They had talked, and joked, and had sex and cuddled, and if later moments of silence established, he wouldn’t interrupt them. Just stay there, like now, and run his fingers over his hair.

Marius hummed above him.

Tonight was different, however. He had noticed since he entered the room. There was something in his smile, in the way he took his hand and guided him to bed, the way his anxious energy seemed way over normal while they fucked. It was as if he was half here, and half there, inside his mind.

He raised his head a bit and kissed the top of Marius’. He was ready to share now, he knew. That’s where his feeling of dread was coming from.

Laying on top of him, he started trailing fingers in circular patterns above the metal stomach. “Brian?” he asked.

He knew he was awake, but he still asked. That resonated on the drumbot head for a bit before answering. “Yeah?”

“Can I ask you something? It’s…” he didn’t look up. “It’s about marks” he finally finished.

Hadn’t he been expecting something _that_ bad, Brian was sure he would have been taken back.

Whenever they talked about marks (that was definitely _not_ often, three times in the last millennium at most) they always asked first. It was not a nice topic for them to discuss, after all. With it, it always came the feeling of loss and uncertainty, the knowledge that not only were they _less_ than the rest, that they would never have that special brand of happiness that came with the security of being in the right place with the right person. That tomorrow they would also be, and the day after, and so on. No, but that there was someone, out there, searching for them and not knowing why they couldn’t find them.

Marius still conserved a crude drawing of the mark he used to have. It was of no use, because the person that used to share it was long since dead, but Brian didn’t ask why he had it. He knew that, if he could remember what his used to look like, he would also look at it every day, as some form of paying respects of what could have been.

Brian didn’t know where Marius wanted to go from there, but he knew it would hurt either way.

“I’m on EjM,” he said instead, because he was a coward and wanted to have one more moment. “I can change if you want,” he offered.

Marius shook his head in his chest. “No. You should be able to lie if you want.”

That did surprise the drumbot. “Do you want me to lie?” He had always been one to prefer the harsher truth.

“No, but it’s hardly honesty if you have no other option”

Brian hummed, and petted his hair again. They had had that conversation a thousand of times, mainly because Marius was the only one disposed to discuss ethics with him. That argument was a favorite of him. It’s not _nice_ unless you have the option of being mean, he would say. Curiously enough, he only found himself agreeing on MjE.

A couple of beating were spent like that, until Marius spoke again. “We don’t have to talk if you don’t want to,” he told him.

But they had, he thought. If he didn’t talk to him about it, he would just bury those feelings inside himself. It’s not that he couldn’t talk with any of the others, they weren’t that kind of people (the asshole kind. Or at least not when it came to unmarked people). It’s just that it wasn’t the same.

The end was helping Marius feel better, or at least process his anguish, and the means were facing his dread and perhaps getting gloomy.

At least he would get cuddles afterwards. Cuddling always helped.

“Shoot,” he said to him, wrapping his arm.

He didn’t ask immediately, instead taking time to make sure to say it right. It was fine, he could wait for as long as he needed. Finally, “Do you think our relationship is fake?”

It hurt.

Brian tried not to let it show, however, caressing his back with his hand in a way to say I’m not ignoring you, just thinking.

He knew that he knew that, in the same way he knew that he meant no harm with the question. Marius was happy with their relationship (or at least that’s what the drumbot liked to believe) and the doubt was purely philosophical in nature. He should at least try and give him an equally cold response.

“Would you mind explaining me your train of thought?” he asked after a while. “So I can know where to go with the answer”

Marius was now fidgeting with his metal arm, he noticed. He resisted the urge to make him drop it. “Like, take Tim and Bertie,” he started. “It was in no way perfect, and issues aroused, but they worked on it. We… what we did to have this relationship, all the emotional stuff, we didn’t really know what we were doing back then. I believed we would be friends, for example.” He took a deep breath to say what he had really wanted to say all along. “And then there is the fact that we are both immortal, and the only ones without a mark. I… I would understand if we forced things, consciously or not, to be as they are now.”

The drumbot wanted to grab him and hug him and tell him that no, that this was real. Who cared whether they had some weird spot on their skin when they had each other. When Marius would sometimes make him those weird pastries he loved so much, or when he would listen to him ramble about whatever had recently caught his attention. They didn’t need any mark to tell them this was right, not when they had great sex, and equally great aftercare.

He grabbed his hands on his, both metal and flesh.

When he had been feeling bad about his condition, he had asked Marius if it felt different, one hand to the other. He hadn’t kissed him, or told him that it made no difference to him. Instead, he sat down next to him and told him every difference he could spot, from the physicals sensations to the psychological way he viewed them.

He had spent so long encased in metal, he couldn’t recall what it was to have flesh. It had been nice to be told the truth, no pity, just a straight answer. He wanted to do the same for him.

“I can answer if it’s real right now,” Brian said.

“I think it’s as real as math, and music, and Space France. All of those are made up, with the closest thing of evidence being a lot of people shouting at you if you dare to doubt them, and yet we dance and count and shout unintelligible words to one another” he felt his boyfriend smile against his chest. “Even if we don’t shout it out loud, if you look at me the way you do, and let me grab your hand; that’s real enough for me.” He squeezed his hand as he finished talking.

Marius looked up at him with wet eyes and kissed him. He kissed back.

It was not a good kiss. Brian was smiling way too much, and Marius was still thinking about what he said, and neither of them had his mind on it. But it was theirs, and that was enough.

Eventually the kiss broke, and they got back to the position they were before, with Brian not letting go of his hand. “But there’s something else I want to say, if you give me a moment,” he mumbled, nuzzling his face on his hair. He had the loveliest of curls, always so soft.

In response Marius nodded, playing with Brian’s fingers.

When they had first started their relationship, Brian had asked Ivy (in private, of course) what the odds of him and Brian being soulmates were. Call it self-flagellation, but in the moment it had seemed like a good idea, and he had wanted to know. She had not wanted to tell him, and it actually took him a long time to convince her to do so.

He didn’t remember her answer exactly, but that day he had heard both the smallest and greatest numbers he could even begin to consider in a single sentence.

Marius was, almost surely, not his soulmate. He had long since come at peace with never having a true one, and had given plenty of tough to the relationship with the man. He had now to somehow express his conclusion, the one he had spent millennium coming up with.

Living across the galaxy, he familiarized with the idea most civilizations had that speaking with your soulmate was something that came easy. That it was as if someone had uncapped a bottle and all the words flowed swiftly in front of them. There was no fear of judgement, after all, or rejection.

It was not the case here. Communication, they had both agreed, was a very important reason why their relationship worked so well, as there was no safe net to hold them together. They had to be careful with their words. That was why he took his time before speaking, and why Marius knowingly gave it to him.

“I don’t think you can have a soulmate without a mark” he stated. “I have been thinking for a while, and I found that most of the romantics of the idea comes from the security of knowing you can’t go wrong. Whatever happens, however much you fuck up, there will be someone that still loves you the next day.”

Over him, his boyfriend didn’t say anything as he let him continue. It was a good thing he couldn’t see his face, he tough.

“You are almost surely not my soulmate, and I will never be able to love you as such. And the same goes the other way around. But that doesn’t make my love for you any less than the one I could have had I still my mark. It’s just… different.” He closed his eyes, mentally preparing himself for what he was about to say.

“Loving you the way I love you is to look at your eyes, knowing that I would be as happy or more with a thousands of millions of other people, and still being able to say I choose you” he leaned to kiss the top of his head. Then, in a playful whisper, “don’t tell the others, but I think our version is more romantic”

Marius actually chuckled at that.

He kissed his head again, and again, and then leaned even more to reach his forehead; his cheek, his eyes, the tip of his nose. They taste kind of salty, so he kissed them again for good measure. At one point, he lean his head back to meet his lips.

“I love you too,” Marius told him, looking at his eyes. Brian notices that he still seems lost.

He gave him another, last kiss. “That’s not all, is it?”

The violinist rearranges himself, so he can lay on the bed and see his boyfriend face. “You already gave me a lot.”

Brian also moves, now lying on his side. “That’s not what I asked,” he said. Their hands are between both of them, and he shifts his so it’s above the other man’s heart. He shivered at the cold contact, but did not flinch.

“It’s unfair for me to ask.” Then, “it’s also cruel.”

“It’s only unfair if you don’t let me make my mind about it,” he gently pushes.

He would refuse again, but it would be very hypocrite of his part to do so. And he trusted him to tell him if he didn’t want to talk about it. “If you could, would you have your mark back?”

The drumbot understood then what he meant by cruel. “Would I have my skin back?” Not that it would change the answer.

He gulped. “No, just the mark”

For this question he didn’t need to think too deep. “Yeah,” he said.

Marius avoided his eyes, closing his hands. “Right,” he said in a whisper. He wasn’t angry with him. He had after all admitted that his question was cruel, even if he hadn’t realized it would be for both of them.

“Hey,” Brian called, trying to get his attention. He repeated himself until he looked up at him, not at his eyes, but at least in his general direction. “That doesn’t mean that I would leave you if I got it back tomorrow.”

“No?” Much against his intention, his tone was hopeful.

“I meant it when I said that I choose you above anyone else” he gently pushed on his chest.

He smiled a bit at that, and entitled his legs with his. Brian searched to see if there was something else there. “Marius?” he asked when he started to bite his lips.

This time he got it out of his chest. “But why would you want your mark then?” he sounded accusatory. Seeming to realize that, he added “Sorry that was a shit thing to say. You don’t have to tell me.”

Brian curled even nearer to him, making sure to have on a friendly and open expression. “It’s fine, love. You can ask,” he grabbed his hand with the one that wasn’t on his chest. “It has to do with what we discussed before, of being able to choose, even if you end up taking the same path”

Marius closed his eyes, breathing deeply. It was nice to have gotten rid of all those thoughts at last that had been plaguing him for a few days now. He felt… calmer. “I’m sorry for getting angry” he muttered.

The dumbass chuckled at him. “You can’t apologize for having an emotion, Marius. That’s being alive. As long as we can talk things, we will be fine.”

“You make it sound too easy,” he complained, curling up against him, deciding that it was time to go to sleep.

“That’s because I’m on Cool Brian” the drumbot said.

Marius punched him on the arm with his metal hand, trying to shut him up, and the sound of brass against metal was opaque against his laughter.

**Author's Note:**

> Marius: What is love?  
> My dumb ass: Baby don't hurt me
> 
> Now that i got the joke out of my system. My eyes have been opened to the angst posibilities of soulmates aus.
> 
> Thank you for reading! Kudos/Comments/Bookmarks makes me feel like Brian when Marius cooks him apple roses (you can pry boyfriends giving each other apple roses from my cold dead hands)


End file.
